


we used to hold hands

by trippslair



Category: 2.43 清陰高校男子バレー部 | 2.43: Seiin Koukou Danshi Volley-bu (Anime)
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, How Do I Tag, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-15 13:09:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29684466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trippslair/pseuds/trippslair
Summary: They held hands, as kids, but Yuni never thought much of it. It's not until an unexpected kiss threatens to drive them apart again that different feelings begin to surface.
Relationships: Haijima Kimichika/Kuroba Yuni
Comments: 10
Kudos: 39





	we used to hold hands

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this after ep 2 aired and... it turned out so much longer than I'd expected. Enjoy!

Yuni wasn’t sure how he’d ended up here, but one thing had led to another, and now his hands were in Chika’s coat pockets and their mouths were pressed together. Chika’s fingers gripped his elbow. His lips pressed softly, carefully against Yuni’s own before he pulled back.

Fifteen minutes ago they’d still been training, listening as Oda gave pointers for their next game. Only five minutes ago they had finished cleaning up, just the two of them as punishment for fighting—again—over something so insignificant Yuni had already forgotten why he’d gotten worked up in the first place.

And now… this. If you’d told Yuni at any point in his life that he’d be kissing his childhood friend outside the school gym, he’d have scoffed and rolled his eyes. _As if._

They’d left the gym, Yuni complaining about the crisp evening breeze on his bare arms after the sun had disappeared behind the clouds. Chika had said something about how he should be taking better care of himself. Getting a cold could ruin their chances in the next competition. Yuni had shoved his arm, laughing, and he’d found Chika to be warm, and close, and he had wanted to be wrapped up in that warmth. Yuni had pulled him closer.

He couldn’t recall how his mouth had found the other boy’s, but that had been warm, too.

Chika’s breath hit his lips as he exhaled. Yuni wasn’t sure when he’d closed his eyes, but when he opened them, head tilted down, the first thing he saw was his hand resting against Chika’s chest. His gaze trailed upward, to Chika’s shoulder, neck, the upward tilt of the corner of his mouth.

Yuni held back a curse.

Chika’s timid smile tore into him, clawed at his chest where his heart beat fiercely and caused a stabbing pain in his lungs. Because now he couldn’t make it undone. He couldn’t pretend it hadn’t happened. Not when Chika looked at him like that.

So Yuni swallowed his next words—“I’m sorry.”—and returned a feeble smile of his own.

He shivered as a gust of wind blew between them, and his shoulders tensed when Chika reached for him. Chika’s hand fell away.

The boy’s eyebrows knit together, smile gone. “I don’t understand.” He seemed to hesitate on the words, speaking slowly, his voice soft and low as though speaking to himself.

Yuni hated to admit that he didn’t, either. He didn’t understand what had come over him, why he’d kissed Chika. What he understood even less was the twist in his stomach and the hammering of his heart in his chest. The impression of Chika’s lips still on his.

If they talked about it, Yuni was scared for what he might discover. He was scared to hurt Chika, too.

But he was in it now. Chika looked at him, waiting for an explanation, while half a dozen unfinished thoughts muddled Yuni’s brain. In the end, he could only act.

He shouldn’t have done it. He regretted it immediately. But when Chika opened his mouth once more to speak, Yuni crowded him against the wall and kissed him again. Sudden. Hard.

For one moment, Chika kissed him back and Yuni’s heart lurched. The next, he pressed his lips together firmly and tried to turn away.

“Kuroba!”

He hadn’t wanted to talk about it, and that was exactly what Yuni got. He also got a shove to the shoulders, Chika’s fingernails digging into his skin to push him off, and the sight of his friend’s face contorted in panic. The telltale shine of unshed tears in his eyes added another aching stab to Yuni’s chest.

Yuni wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I’m—” _Oh_ now _you’re sorry?_ a pesky voice in the back of his mind provided.

Chika pushed past him without another word.

* * *

The following day, Yuni didn’t go to practice. The next, he didn’t dare skip out again after Oda came to his classroom to ask where he’d been. Missing practice had been an awfully shortsighted solution to the much larger problem that was: Yuni didn’t know how to face Chika after what had happened. After what he’d done. _Twice_. He could have hit himself.

He dragged his feet on the way to the gym after the last bell. Oda and Aoki were already in, bouncing a ball leisurely between them as they waited for the rest of the team to arrive. Oda laughed at something his friend said and Yuni thought, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. He could get through a few hours of this.

“Oi, Kuroba!” Ookuma’s loud arrival had barely prepared Yuni for the firm clap on his back. The second-year squeezed his shoulder, jostling him. “We missed ya yesterday.”

“Yeah, I, erm. You know.” Yuni lifted his shoulders. Ookuma merely laughed before he headed for the locker room.

Distracted by Ookuma’s larger than life energy, Yuni had somehow missed Chika walking in after him.

“Hi,” Yuni said because not a sensible thing made it past the blood rushing in his ears. It was so loud he almost didn’t catch the quiet hello Chika told him in return.

Yuni startled a little, surprised. He’d expected Chika to give him the silent treatment as he had plenty of times before. This had to stand for something, right? If they could be civil with each other, maybe there was hope after all that Yuni could smooth things over between them.

Nothing even had to change.

His hope was short-lived. When they split off in pairs to warm up, Chika made sure to stand on the other side of the court so him and Yuni wouldn’t end up together. Whenever Oda made them line up, there was at least one other person stood between the first-years at all times. When they did despite Chika’s best efforts end up having to cooperate, Yuni missed any pass he was given, and instead of angry eyes and a biting comment, Chika avoided his gaze and bit his tongue every time. Yuni swallowed back tears. He shouldn’t have come after all.

Oda pulled him aside at the end of training to ask what was going on. “Is something on your mind? I know you can do better than this.”

Yuni only shrugged.

“Does it have anything to do with why you didn’t show yesterday? I asked Haijima, but he didn’t seem to—”

“It’s nothing, all right? I’m just…” He ran a hand through his hair. “Distracted. Tests, you know.”

Schoolwork had always been a viable excuse to get out of things with his parents, and it seemed the same was true for his captain. Oda gave him a reassuring smile. “You’ll do fine. Try leaving those worries at the door next time, ‘right?”

“Yes, Oda-senpai.”

It didn’t keep Ookuma from having some fun at Yuni’s expense in the locker room. “I didn’t know you cared so much about a few test scores.” He grinned. “Or is it something else? You worried about the next match already?”

Yuni rolled his eyes. He finished changing back into his school uniform first out of everyone, eager to get out. “Drop it,” he said weakly. “I’ll be back on my game next time.” It wasn’t a promise he knew he could keep, but he’d say anything to get Ookuma off his back.

“Maybe there’s some _one_ else.”

Yuni’s blood turned cold in his veins. His heart stammered a little. His face gave away too much, and Ookuma barked a laugh.

“Really?” He swung a sweaty arm around Yuni’s neck, holding him in a lock. “You have to tell us about these things, Kuroba! Hey, Haijima, you probably know more than we do, right? Don’t you, Haijima?”

Heath crawled up Yuni’s neck. He began to try and stutter his way out of it before Chika said, “You heard him, Ookuma. Drop it.” His voice was so frigid it made everyone pause what they were doing. He met Yuni’s eyes for just a second, then finished buttoning up his shirt like nothing had happened.

Ookuma released Yuni from his hold, and Yuni flattened his hair just to give his restless hands something to do. Before Oda could say anything to quell the tension in the room, Yuni grabbed his bag and left.

His footsteps were impossibly loud in the empty hallway, pounding against his eardrums as sound bounced off the walls and echoed against the high ceiling. He walked with only the strange buzzing in his head as his company until he reached the school gates. Nearby, a few guys from the rugby team barked laughs as one punched the other on the arm.

Yuni clenched his hands to fists. Ookuma was only joking around. It wouldn’t usually have affected him at all.

It was the frost in Chika’s gaze when they’d finally locked eyes that had sent him running, cutting off any residual hope Yuni had fostered that things would simply go back to normal between them.

He could feel the chill of it now, piercing between his shoulder blades till he turned around. Chika wore his headphones and kept his head down. He seemed fully intent on walking past Yuni without acknowledging him at all.

Yuni couldn’t let it happen.

“Haijima, wait.” He put his hand around Chika’s wrist. The muscles in his arm tensed.

“What?” Chika slipped his headphones around his neck. Yuni couldn’t decipher the sound of his voice.

“Can we talk?” Yuni’s fingers loosened around Chika’s hand, but he didn’t break that sliver of contact between them. Neither did. “Will you talk to me?”

Not doing so earlier had been a mistake, Yuni realized. He’d known it then, he’d known it when he locked himself in his room with only his thoughts, and when he avoided Chika in the hallways at school.

Chika opened his mouth to speak, but he clicked his jaw shut when voices rose close to them. Yuni looked over his shoulder to the rugby guys who’d started toward them, heading for the gate to leave.

Chika pulled his hand back before they could see.

They used to hold hands as kids, Yuni remembered, but he could never recall why they’d stopped. A single glance now at these guys looking over at them reminded him. Boys from school would poke fun. They’d tug at Chika’s arm until he let go. And he always did let go first. Between the two of them, he had always cared more about what the other kids said back then. Even now.

“If you don’t want anything to do with me,” Yuni said, “why did you say that to Ookuma back there?”

“I wasn’t going to let him pester you.”

“But why not?” He deserved a lot worse. He’d been a jerk, and he still couldn’t allow Chika the distance between them that the boy seemed to want.

“Forget it,” Chika said. He kept his eyes trained on the ground by their feet and shook his head firmly. “Just forget about it.”

* * *

Yuni spent the weekend trying to ignore the gnawing in the pit of his stomach. He distracted himself with homework, music, and even joined Itoko on a shopping trip till he began to believe he could deal with seeing Chika again at practice Monday afternoon. But still the feeling of Chika’s eyes following him around the court made him falter.

It showed in the serves that hit the net, spikes flying way out of bounds, and failing again and again to get past the blocks. And he felt it in the twist in his foot when he landed haplessly after a jump. He knelt, hands wrapped around his throbbing ankle. Was it just him, or was it turning purple already? He yelped when Aoki prodded it.

“Probably sprained,” he said to Oda.

Their captain winced like he’d felt it himself. “That’s rough. Haijima!” he called over Yuni’s head. “Take him to the nurse’s office.”

For a second, Yuni forgot about his aching joint. “It’s fine.” He tried to stand and buckled the moment he put any weight on it. “I can go by myself,” he still said through gritted teeth.

Oda gave him a funny look. “Haijima,” he said again.

“Yes.” Yuni didn’t look at Chika as he appeared by his side and put Yuni’s arm over his shoulder, his own around Yuni’s waist. Neither said anything else for the entire uncomfortable hobble-walk to the nurse’s office.

Yuni bit his teeth together as the nurse moved his foot this way and that with shockingly little regard for his discomfort. She agreed with Aoki’s earlier assessment.

“Rest,” she ordered as she made a note on a piece of paper. “I’ll get you some crutches so you don’t have to walk on it. Put ice on it when you get home.” She looked at him over the brim of her glasses. “And no volleyball for a while.”

Yuni nodded. It sucked, but it wasn’t like he’d expected any different. He’d been more scared she’d tell him it was broken instead.

“Can you get his things?” Chika nodded. She turned back to Yuni to ask: “Is there anyone who could see you home? To help carry your bag?”

“Oh, erm.” His eyes flitted to Chika. “I’ll be fine by myself.”

“I can do it,” Chika said, making Yuni’s heart leap in his throat. His sharp gaze cut short any objections Yuni might have had. And he had plenty.

It was only because they took the same train home anyway, Yuni told himself. Chika had made it clear he didn’t want to be anywhere near Yuni; and Yuni didn’t blame him.

The nurse bandaged Yuni’s ankle up tight while Chika ran back to collect his things. He returned having already changed into his own uniform, ready to go. He left Yuni’s clothes at the end of the bed and closed the curtains so Yuni could change out of his gear.

While he was alone, Yuni considered how he could get Chika a way out of having to help him. Once they left the school, there was no way the nurse could tell if they stuck together. He’d just tell Chika to go ahead then.

Yuni finished changing and stood using the crutches. He was surprised to find Oda waiting on the other side of the curtain.

He grimaced. “What’s the verdict?”

The nurse stepped up to fill him in before Yuni could. He could see the gears turning behind Oda’s eyes as he tried to understand what this meant for their team in the next weeks. In the end, he failed to conceal a sigh. “All you got to do right now is rest,” he echoed the nurse’s instructions. “We’ll need you back there as soon as possible.”

Yuni stared at the ground, embarrassed. He never meant to let the team down. “Got it.”

Oda left first, hitting the hallway running despite the nurse’s warning not to. Yuni lingered a few steps behind Chika on their way out. When Chika looked back to see what was taking him, Yuni pretended to struggle with the crutches that bit into his armpits.

 _He’s just doing as he’s asked_ , Yuni reminded himself stubbornly. _He doesn’t care how I get home._

Chika fixed the strap of Yuni’s bag on his shoulder as he waited at the gates going into the station.

“You don’t have to wait for me,” Yuni muttered, but it was more to fill the silence than anything else. Chika didn’t listen.

Only few people boarded the train to Monshiro at this time. Once they got on and Yuni almost tripped over the gap—he really wasn’t very nimble with these things—Chika made Yuni sit and put his foot up on the seat.

“The swelling needs to go down,” he explained. He sat on Yuni’s other side and turned to look out the window. “The better you care for it, the sooner you’ll be able to play again.”

In the end, it always came down to volleyball with him.

Silence sat like a physical thing between them for the rest of the train ride. Whenever Yuni did open his mouth to say something, he felt it like a weight pressing on his chest, holding him down and stealing the words right from his lungs.

He couldn’t get a read on Chika. He couldn’t tell if the boy was waiting for him to apologize, or if he seriously expected Yuni to forget it happened. Either way, if there was one thing Yuni had learned in the past week, it was that he couldn’t forget about it. His cheeks still flushed at the memory of Chika’s lips against his, his hands warm on Yuni’s arms.

More frustratingly, he learned he didn’t _want_ to forget, either.

The train lurched to a halt at their hometown and Yuni stood with all the grace of a newborn giraffe. He reached for his bag, but Chika swatted his hand away.

“I got it from here,” Yuni insisted, forcing himself to speak after all. He didn’t need Chika to detour on his way home. He couldn’t stand another minute of this torture.

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Chika scoffed. He hoisted his own bag on one shoulder and Yuni’s on the other. Outside the station gates, he started in the direction of Yuni’s house, ignoring the boy staggering behind him.

Chika slowed his pace so they walked next to each other no matter how bad Yuni tried to lag behind. Yuni was surprised when Chika started making small talk about some homework he still had to do, and he complained about a teacher who always showed up distracted to class.

“Oh, yeah. Un.” Yuni didn’t exactly have much to add to the conversation. Half his mind was on the space between their shoulders as they walked side by side, and the lack of it when the sidewalk narrowed. He hummed at the right times and spoke only a handful of words until they were walking up to his house. He opened the front door and called inside to let his parents know he was home.

He turned to take his bag from Chika. They lingered in the hallway. Yuni cleared his throat, his heart beating painfully in his ribcage as he asked, “Are you coming in?”

Chika’s reply left him deflated. “I should go home.”

Yuni tried not to let it sting. He had foolishly gotten his hopes up once again, as Chika had cracked a single smile on the way over, that maybe he’d been forgiven. Maybe they were on the path to making up. “Right,” he said. He hugged his bag to his chest, leaning unsteadily on one foot. “Thanks.”

“Ice that,” Chika reminded him with a nod at his ankle, and he left. Yuni stood motionless in the entryway long after the door slid shut. By the next morning, he had arranged for Nagato to come pick him up for school instead.

* * *

More than once in the weeks that followed did Yuni lie awake for hours as moonlight trailed a languid path across his room.

He could forget about that day only while he was in class. After Yuni successfully avoided Chika all morning and in the hallways, he could sit down to fill his head with equally confusing math and social studies. As much as he wanted to take Oda up on the suggestion to at least watch practice, Yuni usually went home early. Another easy way not to have to face his teammate.

It was in the handful of times he did stop by practice that Yuni watched Chika from the corner of his eye and wondered if anything about him had changed. If there was a difference in the way he talked to Yuni. If there was any way for Yuni to bridge the distance between them and be close to that warmth once again.

Eventually the sleepless nights caught up to him, and one morning he rushed out of the house tie untied and hair uncombed, and about ninety-five percent sure he was going to miss his train. That five percent chance otherwise kept him running at full speed, the lingering sting in his recovering ankle pushed to the back of his mind.

He only crossed onto the platform in time to watch the train pull out of the station.

Yuni ran his hands through his hair in annoyance and groaned loudly. His eyes drifted down the platform, and found the form of another boy in the same uniform as him, equally flustered. A breath caught in his throat. Chika looked up and spotted him before Yuni could run. Forcing his feet, he walked over.

“Missed the train?” he asked redundantly. Why else would Chika still be here, hair plastered to his forehead where he’d worked up a sweat? Dark circles under his eyes suggested he’d had as little sleep as Yuni did.

Chika didn’t even deem it worthy of a straight answer. “When’s the next one?” he asked instead after he got his breath back.

Yuni lifted his shoulders. “Not for a long time.” He laughed, though it felt as hollow as the echo of it across the tracks. “Nothing like the trains in Tokyo, is it?”

“Not at all,” Chika muttered. He sighed, looking around the forlorn train station and its single bench. Its white paint chipped off. Pale morning light fell on the tracks, but they stood in the cool shadow. “Should we go wait somewhere else?”

 _We?_ Yuni wanted to ask, but he bit his tongue and nodded, not looking to push his luck. Chika could just as easily decide to leave him standing there.

A low wall wrapped around the outside of the station. Chika dropped his bag by his feet and lifted himself up to sit on top of it. He leaned his elbows on his legs. “How much longer until the next train?”

Yuni remained standing, though he favored his good leg. He kicked a pebble that skidded across the street. “Honestly”—he leaned back against the wall, hands in his pockets—“I don’t think there is another one.” They only really ran for commuting high schoolers, and they’d been so late they missed the last one.

Chika nodded to himself. “We’re skipping school, then.” He said it as easily as if he was deciding what to have for dinner.

Yuni straightened. “I’ll ask Yori if—” He fell back against the wall when Chika stopped him by the collar of his blazer.

“Don’t bother.” He got this kind of perturbed look whenever Yori came up, like something simmered hot behind his usually cool eyes. Yuni restrained from poking at it for fear of burning himself. “I don’t mind.”

A warmth fluttered in the pit of Yuni’s stomach. He stamped it out, telling himself that didn’t mean Chika was fine spending the day with him instead. He would probably head home soon.

But for now, Yuni kept perfectly still, as though he could trick Chika into forgetting he was there at all.

Five minutes passed, then fifteen, in which not another soul appeared near the station. Yuni began to grow agitated on his feet, wanting to move, to go anywhere at all but stay rooted to the spot with this silence hanging over them like a storm cloud waiting to break.

He feared for just that when Chika jumped off the wall. He picked up his bag. _This is it_ , Yuni thought, _he’s going to get away from me_.

“Do you want anything?”

“Huh?”

Chika nodded to the vending machines down the street. “I’m getting something to drink.”

“Oh. Erm, whatever you’re having.”

While Chika was away, Yuni struggled to get his thoughts in order. He shook his head and ran his hands through his hair. Chika _wasn’t_ leaving. They were still here, together, with the whole day yet ahead of them.

He held his heart for what that meant and lowered himself to sit against the wall.

He jumped when the cold can touched his cheek, startling him out of his reverie. Chika almost seemed to smile.

“Thanks,” Yuni mumbled. Chika’s fingers brushed his as he handed it over, and Yuni pressed the can back against his face to cool his heating cheeks.

The silence from earlier had taken a different shape. It was a little softer around the edges, a little more forgiving. It didn’t push the air from Yuni’s lungs so much as it helped him breathe easier again.

He noticed Chika hadn’t even opened his drink. He wiped away the condensation with the pad of his thumb, can clenched between both hands before he spoke.

“I think I do want to talk about it.” He didn’t have to explain what _it_ was.

Yuni took a shuddering breath and held it until his head began to spin. Or maybe that was just the effect of Chika glancing at him from the corner of his eyes, deep blue behind his glasses.

Many of the nights spent tossing and turning, Yuni had thought about just what he would say. He’d never been able to figure out the answer.

“I didn’t know I was going to do that,” he said truthfully.

Chika nodded like he’d expected as much. They’d both been taken aback by the moment. “So why did you?” he asked.

“I—I don’t know!” Yuni threatened to burst with all he’d been keeping in for so long, festering like a wound the longer it went unspoken and the more they danced around it. “I don’t know,” he repeated, the words leaving him like a sigh. He pressed his hands against his legs. “But I am so sorry for pushing you. I panicked, I—” He shook his head. “There’s no excuse. I should not have done that. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t have to forgive you.” Something cold had crept back into Chika’s voice, steely and unrelenting.

“You don’t. I don’t expect you to.” Yuni dared a glance at the boy next to him. Chika’s fingers twitched around the can in his hand. A woman on a bicycle drove past them before Yuni continued. “Is there anything I can do to make things… maybe not right, but better?”

A long moment passed, and Yuni figured that was answer enough. There was nothing he _could_ do.

“You can start by being honest with me.”

“Honest?”

“Why did you kiss me?” Chika looked up, and Yuni felt trapped. It was the first time either of them had said it so plainly. “The first time,” he added.

“I told you, I don’t know.”

Chika clicked his tongue. “That’s bullshit.”

His words were like a bucket of ice water over the head. Something snapped in Yuni, and he threw his hands up, defeated. Some of his drink spilled over and dripped down his fingers.

“What do you want me to say? That I’ve probably liked you since we were children, but I never knew what to make of those feelings? That I still thought about holding your hand long after we stopped doing that? Or that I haven’t been able to get that kiss out of my head no matter how hard I try?” He paused, chest heaving with labored breaths. “Because yeah,” he said with a resigned sigh. He hunched in on himself. “All of that.” _And I don’t know what to do about it._

While he’d been scared to find Chika’s eyes narrowed, nose pulled up in disdain, the boy instead looked at Yuni like he’d just discovered long-buried treasure at the bottom of a dirty sandpit. Something shiny in a place where he’d least expected it.

Yuni wiped his hand on his shirt, faltering under Chika’s scrutiny.

“Yuni…”

His head shot up at the familiar sound of his name spilling from Chika’s lips. Yuni found himself watching those lips before his eyes snapped up to meet Chika’s own.

A growl emitting from Yuni’s stomach broke the spell, an unwelcome guest come to crash the moment. Embarrassed, he rubbed his neck, leaning back and avoiding Chika’s gaze. He flushed as Chika struggled to hold back a laugh next to him.

“Should we get some food?” Chika suggested.

“We should.” Certainly if it put off talking about… _that_ a little longer. Yuni was still collecting his thoughts, trying to sort through the rush in his veins that was making his fingers tingle and tap restlessly against his leg.

What had he just confessed to?

Chika stood first, pretending not to notice that Yuni needed another moment to gather himself. He finally pushed himself to his feet, and they started for town. His fingers continued their erratic rhythm against his thigh.

It only stopped when Chika’s hand slipped into his, cool slender fingers fitting loosely between Yuni’s. Chika didn’t meet his eyes, but a blush dusted his cheeks as they walked a little closer together.

* * *

Heat prickled Yuni’s scalp as they walked into the convenience store. As his palms began to sweat he was grateful Chika had let go of his hand moments ago.

When Yuni stopped frozen in the doorway, Chika tugged him along by the strap of his bag. He picked up some bread and two boxed lunches and put them in Yuni’s arms to carry.

“You haven’t cut class a lot, have you?”

Yuni looked around with a start, but there was no one else in the store to overhear them. “You have?” he asked in a hushed whisper.

Chika hitched his shoulders up to his ears. “A few times in middle school. Before I stopped going altogether.”

Yuni’s feet were heavy on the way to the register. They weren’t supposed to be here. High school students were expected to be just there—at school. But if the young man checking them out thought anything of the two boys buying their bentou, he didn’t show it. Chika paid while Yuni took the plastic bag with their food.

“I’ll pay you back,” Yuni promised as they left the store. Chika waved it off.

They each bit into sweet bread they bought as they walked with no goal in mind. They avoided discussing what Oda and, more frighteningly, Aoki would say when they found not one but two of their team members missing practice at the end of the day. Chika asked how Yuni’s ankle was.

“It acts up sometimes,” he said.

“Tell me if we need to stop walking.”

Yuni thought he could get used to Chika worrying over him. He pressed his lips together to hide a smile. “I will.”

A town like Monshiro made it easy to avoid running into too many people. They passed around the back of their old middle school and listened to the cheers and yells from kids out on the sports field. At one point they circled around to the karaoke boxes Yuni’s cousin frequented. Had Yuni been paying attention to where their feet lead them, he would have known to avoid the place.

The reason why appeared a few meters ahead of them, thankfully preoccupied as he struggled with the zip on his guitar case. The small part of Yuni’s brain that was not currently short-circuiting in a panic wondered idly what Yori was doing here in the middle of the day.

“Sh—”

Before Yuni could get them both caught, Chika pulled him back around the corner and into a narrow space between the karaoke boxes, back pressed against the wall. Chika held his finger to his mouth, an uncharacteristically mischievous smile playing on his lips that Yuni found his eyes glued to. Yori could be heard quietly cursing at something. His footsteps grew louder before the sound moved away from the boys.

They both exhaled with relief, Chika’s breath warm against Yuni’s cheek.

Yuni swallowed, and his cheeks warmed at the return of that playful little smile on his friend’s lips.

Chika’s gaze dropped down to Yuni’s mouth for just a flash before he took a step back, leaving him to try and _calm down_. He couldn’t get a height of Chika—didn’t know where they stood after Yuni had confessed to liking him.

Because that was the only way to describe the twisting feeling in his stomach and the tightness in his chest. Yuni had fallen for his friend. He wasn’t sure when it had happened, or if that even mattered at all.

He was anxious for any kind of response from Chika.

Disrupting his overthinking, Chika held up the crinkling plastic bag from the convenience store. “Let’s find someplace to eat these.”

“My parents aren’t home,” Yuni blurted. Warmth crawled up the back of his neck when Chika looked at him with questioning eyes. “I mean. We could go there. They wouldn’t know we’re not at school. And it beats having to eat outside.” He lost conviction the longer he talked.

“Let’s go.”

Yuni perked up. “Really?”

Chika smiled. “Really.” His eyes flickered to Yuni’s hand like he might hold it again, but then he turned and began to walk. “I’m starving.”

* * *

Yuni took his key from his schoolbag, fingers tight around it as he unlocked the front door.

“I’m home” he called quietly inside, keeping an ear out hopefully for no answer. A good ten seconds of silence later, he finally let out his breath.

He stepped in and turned to find Chika waiting by the door.

Yuni swallowed before he asked, “Are you coming in?” Last time, he’d been shot down.

Today, Chika nodded. He kicked off his shoes and placed them neatly side by side next to Yuni’s. Yuni sent him ahead to his room while he got them drinks from the kitchen.

He walked on tiptoes through the living room, like someone might be right around the corner, just waiting to bust him. He took another breath only when he stood in front of the fridge and he was sure both his parents were indeed away. He let the cold air cool his face as he picked up a couple of sodas.

Back in Yuni’s room, Chika sat in front of the low shelf against the wall, eyes skimming his collection of books and music. He pried one CD-case from its spot and looked at the track list on the back before his eyes drifted to the poster of the same band tacked above Yuni’s desk.

“I didn’t know you were a fan,” Chika noted.

Yuni had been obsessed with them for a short while a few years ago and never took down the signs of that. “Just a little.” He set the soda cans on the table and sat next to Chika. “You know them?”

“I saw them live once.”

“Ah. Tokyo.”

Chika laughed softly, the sound like music to Yuni’s ears that not even his favorite bands could win out against. “You always say that as if it’s some sort of fantasy place,” Chika said. “You’ve _been_ there.”

“Well, it’s still not Monshiro, that’s for sure.” The city had felt as unreachable as the sun when Chika had first moved away. Sometimes, Yuni still struggled to believe that his childhood friend had moved back after all that time. “I missed you,” he admitted. “While you were living there.”

Chika set the CD back on the shelf. He let his knee rest against Yuni’s. “I missed you too. I didn’t realize until we started hanging out again.”

“Why didn’t we stay in touch?”

Chika shrugged. “We were kids.”

There was more he wasn’t saying. It couldn’t have been easy, starting over in a big new city without his mother. Yuni now wished he would have made more of an effort, rang his phone, wrote letters for all he cared. Anything to let Chika know he didn’t have to go through that alone. That he didn’t have to go through everything that’d happened in middle school by himself, either.

But they’d been kids. And it didn’t do to dwell on what-ifs.

Yuni made a promise not to make the same mistakes twice.

He turned to take out their lunch, setting everything out on the table. They’d made the mistake of buying food on an empty stomach, but Yuni considered it a challenge to finish it all.

The way Chika hid a chuckle behind his hand indicated that, maybe sometimes, it was okay to back down from a challenge. For example, at the point where your stomach threatened to burst.

Yuni stretched out on his back. His feet poked out on the other side of the table.

“I could get used to this,” he said. It was only a little past noon. At school, his classmates would be starting Math around now, and a handful of people might still question why he wasn’t in class.

He wondered if anyone had noticed that Chika was also absent. That they could be spending the day together.

Yuni only moved when Chika started to clear the table and clean up their trash.

“I’ve got it,” Yuni said, pushing up from the floor. In his rush to grab the empty packaging from Chika, he kicked the table and spilled soda all over the place. He somehow managed to throw down a napkin before it could run down the table and onto the tatami floor.

 _Mom would kill me_ , he thought and only when Chika laughed did he realize he’d said it out loud. “She would, okay!?”

“I know, I know.” Chika stood and tapped his hand to Yuni’s shoulder, a gesture so small and yet so intimate, and started for the hallway. “I’ll get some kitchen towels.”

They cleaned up the rest of the spill and tossed everything into the plastic bag in the middle of the table to be dealt with later.

“I’m a klutz,” Yuni whined.

“You are.”

“Oi.” He elbowed Chika’s arm. Then, emboldened, he put his hand over Chika’s and squeezed. Chika looked down at it with a smile.

This felt good. This felt right. But unless they lay everything out in front of them, he wouldn’t be able to get past the look of panic and anger that’d been etched on Chika’s face that one evening.

“I really didn’t know I was going to kiss you then.”

“I believe you.”

Yuni looked down at their joined hands and forced himself to ask, “Did you hate it?”

“Of course not.” Chika looked at him, wide-eyed, like he couldn’t fathom what had given Yuni the idea.

It was like a slap in the face. Because Yuni didn’t feel like he deserved to be looked at like that.

“But then I pushed you.”

“That didn’t feel good.”

“It wasn’t!” Yuni tugged at Chika’s hand in his fervor. “And I was sorry. _Am_ sorry. I can’t tell you enough how much.” He averted his eyes, looking down at the fingers of his free hand scratching against the tatami. “It’s what I should have said back then.”

Chika nodded. He was quiet for a moment, like he needed time to think it over. Yuni could only wish it wouldn’t end in him getting up and leaving the room.

“I think I know how you felt. When we were younger.”

“Really?” Yuni dared let a hint of hope spill into his voice.

“Un. And I couldn’t stop thinking about it, either.”

“Why were you avoiding me then?”

“I…” Chika dropped his gaze. “I didn’t understand. And I was scared,” he said finally.

Yuni frowned. “Scared?”

Chika took a steadying breath. “That if we talked, you would tell me it didn’t mean anything to you. That you wanted us to move on like nothing had happened.” He shook his head. “I couldn’t do that.”

Yuni saw his own worries reflected in Chika’s eyes, in the way they darted to Yuni’s face and away again. It _was_ scary. And new and exciting and Yuni hadn’t known that he wanted any of this.

“Me neither,” Yuni said, though he’d tried. Instead the feeling had only intensified. “I still feel like I messed everything up,” he whispered, eyes widening as Chika moved incrementally closer to him.

“You didn’t.” Chika brushed the back of his fingers against Yuni’s cheek. There was the slightest, puzzled furrow between his eyebrows. “Can I try something?”

Yuni’s eyes flicked down to his lips. “Yes.”

This time it was Chika who kissed him.

It was soft, warm, a little uncertain. Everything it had been the first time, and Yuni was grateful to get a second chance.

His hand slipped to the back of Chika’s neck, fingers curling into soft hair. The other rested against Chika’s chest and found a heartbeat as thundering as his own. He smiled against Chika’s mouth and laughter bubbled in his chest. There was no reason to rush, no reason to push. Yuni only hoped Chika hadn’t changed his mind about them, and he was about to ask as much when the sound of the front door opening made them jump.

“Are you expecting anyone?” Chika asked.

“Obviously not.” Yuni scrambled up to put his ear against the door. There was shuffling in the entryway, followed by his mother’s confused voice.

“Yuni? Are you home?”

He muttered a curse under his breath and turned back to Chika, whispering, “We could try running.”

“On our socks?”

“I never said it was ideal.”

It didn’t matter, because not ten seconds later did the door to Yuni’s room slide open, and his mom stood with her hand on her hip demanding an explanation.

* * *

One sunny evening found Yuni and Chika once again staying last to clean up—this time because Yuni had been too distracted during training watching a certain setter on the other side of the net to listen to a word Aoki said. Chika had stayed back by his own choice.

“Look, look.” Yuni readied himself to spike a volleyball into the cart from the other side of the court. It bounced off the border and rolled onto the floor. He let his shoulders hang, dejected.

“ _This_ is why you should listen to Aoki,” Chika chastised. So maybe he hadn’t stayed behind out of the goodness of his heart, but instead to lecture Yuni some more.

Yuni huffed. “You’re starting to sound more and more like him,” he said through pursed lips.

“What was that?”

“Nothing!” Yuni wasn’t looking for a fight. He caught the ball Chika tossed back to him.

“Try again.”

“Training’s over,” Yuni argued.

“Training’s never over. Why are you laughing? Oi.”

Yuni threw the ball up in the air and spiked it straight into the cart. He pumped his fist with a cheer.

“I guess that was all right,” Chika said.

Yuni walked over. He held his hands behind his back, leaning in front of Chika. “It was more than all right,” he said.

“It was good.”

“Kind of great, if you ask me.”

“Are you trying to get me to compliment you?”

“Maybe. Will you?”

Chika did the next best thing and kissed his cheek. “Finish cleaning up, or we’re going to miss the next train home.”

“Yessir!” If he caught Chika fighting a smile, he counted that as a win.

Yuni finished up and dropped the key off in the teacher’s room. On the way to the station, Yuni walked close enough to Chika to feel the warmth of him next to him. He took Chika’s hand in his, the gesture once again as familiar to them as it had been when they were little. Only now, Chika didn’t let go anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> comments/kudos are sure to make me blush as much as the boys in this series do 😶


End file.
